


Soon I'll Come Around

by kendricked



Category: Pitch Perfect (Movies)
Genre: AU, F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-04
Updated: 2020-04-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 05:28:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,104
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22111873
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kendricked/pseuds/kendricked
Summary: Set in the world of Death Stranding, Beca is a freelance porter delivering cargo across the United Cities of America. She accepts an unusual order- an escort mission for a chiral scientist named Chloe Beale. Little does she know there’s more to the delivery than Chloe lets on, and the journey they share will change their lives forever.
Relationships: Chloe Beale/Beca Mitchell
Comments: 44
Kudos: 43





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hey everyone, here's a weird fandom collision AU that nobody asked for and yet I'm doing it anyway lol. I can't stop thinking about the fascinating world building of Death Stranding, and so I felt compelled to add my favorite wlw couple into the mix in an attempt to tell an original story in this world. Thanks for reading this weird thing and bearing with me!

Beca Mitchell pauses for a moment to readjust the weight of her backpack before continuing her journey down the grassy knolls towards Port Knot City, her delivery destination.

_Just a few more miles_ , Beca thinks to herself. _Then you can afford to rest for a few days. Make a few mixes and then take up another order-_

Her thoughts are interrupted by an orange flash a few feet away from her position. 

“Shit. Fucking MULEs!” Beca swears at the triggered metal sensor lodged in the earth, the source of the orange light and her sudden stress level increase.

Gritting her teeth, Beca runs as fast as she can to the nearest patch of tall grass and drops to her knees. The weight of the packages on her back nearly sends her careening backwards but she manages to collect herself just in time.

“Bunch of lazy assholes. All you need to do is work for Bridges, they have tons of cargo available,” Beca mutters irritably to herself as she detaches her bola gun from her tool rack. “But no, let’s steal from the hardworking innocent porters trying to make a living.”

Beca props herself up slightly and readies her weapon, waiting patiently in her hiding spot. An eerie orange silhouette of her cargo floats in midair where it was initially scanned. 

It takes a few minutes before a small truck rolls up to a spot about thirty feet from Beca. She sinks down lower as three MULEs jump out of the truck, brandishing weapons. Two wander near the cargo scan location, and the other starts patrolling the area to Beca’s left.

“They can’t have gotten far,” one says to another.

“Looks like only a few packages. But they’re delicate, which means that cargo is worth a lot.”

Heart nearly beating out of her chest, Beca points her bola gun at her targets one by one, assessing her course of action. While they’re all separately searching for their quarry, they are staying relatively clumped together.

_They’re annoying but they’re not stupid,_ Beca thinks bitterly. This won’t be easy.

The two MULEs by the truck seem reluctant to leave it at first, but eventually start to spread out after a minute or two. The third is a good distance away, but in the direct eyeline of the other two. Naturally.

While Beca dares to release a breath that she was holding, she sees the one MULE closer to her pull out a scanner device, thumb on the trigger. If he pings to locate the cargo again, she’s in trouble. Her decision is made whether she likes it or not.

Beca lines the gun up and fires two shots in quick succession, one around the MULE’s waist and the other at his calves. In three seconds flat he’s lying on the grass, squirming harmlessly. The device lies forgotten in the dirt.

“What the-” says the other MULE, looking at his writhing friend. He doesn’t get a chance to elaborate further as a bola from Beca wraps itself around his mouth, soon followed by another wrapping itself around his ankles, knocking him to the ground.

Grinning at her fortune, Beca stands up from her hiding spot.

“You!” growls a voice behind her.

“Ah yes, there were three of you-” Beca’s sentence ends with a yelp as the third MULE grabs her by the backpack and throws her backward into the dirt with surprising strength. Most of her cargo goes scattering around her into the grass.

Beca clumsily stands up and realizes with horror that she had dropped her bola gun in her surprise. And now it’s in enemy hands, pointed straight at her.

“Listen buddy,” Beca says slowly, extending her arms up in front of her. “Are you even holding that thing at the right end?” 

“Shut up!” shouts the MULE. His finger is on the trigger but then his eyes widen as he sees the symbol on Beca’s jacket’s sleeve. “You- you’re-”

“What, this?” Beca pulls a bit on her sleeve to show off the phi symbol with headphones surrounding it. “Huh. Interesting how it’s being recognized now.”

The MULE looks intimidated for a moment, but his brow furrows resolutely. “Doesn’t matter. Just means your cargo is worth even more than we thought.”

Beca bites her lip, looking at the angle of the shot he’s lining up. He’s aiming at her calves, hoping she’ll land flat on her face before she can try anything. She has a split second to prepare herself before that happens.

With a practiced movement and her eyes still locked on the MULE, Beca’s right hand presses first the button to deploy her odradeck on her shoulder, and then the button below it. A pair of heavy duty noise cancellation headphones pop securely over her ears. She just manages to drag her finger all the way across the touch screen volume pad on her left forearm before the bola tangles itself around her ankles. Beca crashes to the ground as an ear piercing noise erupts from the speaker of her odradeck. 

The MULE in front of her drops the gun immediately, yelling in agony as he covers his ears in a feeble attempt to block out the sound. He drops to his knees, shaking.

Beca makes quick work of the rope around her legs and scrambles to her feet, picking the bola gun up as she does so.

“Eighty five decibels isn’t fun, is it?” Beca says. She promptly knocks the MULE out with the butt of her gun. She swipes her finger the other way on her forearm, lowering the volume.

Afraid of the possibility of reinforcements, Beca quickly loads up her fallen packages, assessing the damages. She clucks her tongue in disapproval as she steps over the fallen MULE as if he were nothing but a pebble.

“Thanks to you greedy assholes I’m gonna need some container spray.”

====

Chloe Beale pours over the lab’s latest test results in frustration. “There’s no way these levels are correct.”

Ashley drums a pencil on the lab counter thoughtfully. “I mean, they could be. We only have the prediction models to go off of right now. We’ll get the correct ratio of tissue to chiral crystal eventually.”

Chloe sighs. For several years, the lab’s chiral crystal levels of necrosis study was going incredibly and infuriatingly slowly. 

“We can’t afford to wait for ‘eventually’ to happen. We could have another voidout on our hands by then. I’ve been saying this for a year now, the only way we’re ever gonna figure this out is if we actually collect legitimate samples. If we know the exact percentage of chiral infection in the body prior to voidout time, we can work more easily to regress the infection or best case scenario, eradicate it entirely. Ideally, collecting tissue samples from a body undergoing necrosis would tell us that percentage. Even if it was an early onset of necrosis, at least it would give the prediction models more of a springboard to go off of.”

“We don’t know if the body at that point is even stable enough to draw tissues from. And the time it would take to collect proper samples from the corpse-”

“-would take way longer than the time we would have. I know. Which is why I’ve been thinking...the second best thing is to collect samples from the scene of a voidout. If we can’t sample before a voidout, then we’re going to have to sample afterwards.”

“Samples from a-” Ashley repeats incredulously. Chloe looks at her so sternly that she entertains the idea. “You can try uploading a retrieval request onto the network. But you’re not going to get many porters willing to even go remotely close to a voidout area. The amount of BTs that kind of place must have…”

“It’s dangerous, I know,” says Chloe. “But what’s more dangerous is the potential of another voidout. One death left unnoticed and not incinerated- that’s all it takes. A whole city population dead in one shot. Then those bodies will undergo necrosis, giving rise to more explosions, it never ends.”

“Chloe, I know,” Ashley replies sympathetically. “But no porter in their right mind is going to want to go into a voidout crater and collect some dirt. Plus, I’m sure you have specific sampling locations in mind-”

“Which is why I would be going with the porter,” says Chloe matter of factly. “I know what I’m looking for, so I’ll collect the samples properly and accurately.“

Ashley looks at Chloe, wide eyed and pale. “Chloe, you’ve been down in the science facility bunker for fifteen years! No offense but you can’t survive out there, you have no idea what it’s like- the timefall, the BTs! Everything!”

“The porter will have experience with that. They’ll tell me,“ replies Chloe. She’d be lying if she said she didn’t get a thrill thinking about exploring the outside world after all these years. She keeps that to herself. “They’ll bring me to the voidout crater, I’ll take the samples, and then we’ll be on our way back.”

“It’s a lot more difficult than it sounds, Chloe,” Ashley warns. “A porter wouldn’t want to go to a voidout crater in general, yet alone be responsible for escorting a civilian there and back.”

Chloe is already typing in the delivery request form as Ashley looks on completely distressed. Chloe stops at the destination field on the screen to look at her friend and colleague. “Which is why-” she examines the surrounding map of the crater and selects a waystation point nearby “-I’ll fib a little on the location. And then redirect us as we travel.”

Ashley gives herself a facepalm before shoving her hands in her lab coat pockets. “I want it on record that I tried to stop you several times from doing this.”

“Duly noted,” replies Chloe with a grin. She hits submit on the order, a mix of adrenaline and worry coursing through her. _I have to do this,_ she thinks to herself, _I have to do this for Stephanie. For everyone. It's the right thing to do._

====

After a long, well deserved night’s sleep at Port Knot City, Beca heads upstairs to the order terminal to view the jobs available for the day. After flipping through countless mundane orders, her eyes fall on the location of a Chiral Crystal Laboratory miles east from her current location.

Assuming it’ll be a standard delivery of glassware and chemicals, Beca’s brow raises in surprise as she reads the words “Escort Delivery Request” instead. She pulls up the map on her cuff link and surveys the distance of the route. It’s a long trip, and Beca knows it’ll feel even longer when she’d be traveling with an inexperienced scientist, this Dr. Chloe Beale of all people. But then she sees the amount of Likes earned if the job were to be completed...that is a crap ton of Likes. Enough to advance her porter rank up by multiple levels, up to the cushy big league ranks.

Before Beca can contemplate this order further, she hits the accept button on the delivery. 

_If this goes sideways, if this scientist is a total wuss, then I’m turning her around and dragging her back,_ Beca reassures herself, _and making her give me the Likes anyway. She’ll wind up thanking me for talking sense back into her and saving her ass. I get the Likes, she gets to live. It's a win-win._

====

“Well it looks like some poor porter fell into your trap,” says Ashley, her eyes scanning the delivery terminal stationed at the entrance to the chiral lab.

“You’re making me sound like a Disney villain. So I’m kinda not telling them a tiny detail of their route, how bad is that? This research could save lives!” replies Chloe earnestly. She walks over to Ashley and peers over her shoulder at the blue screen.

“You have a point,” concedes Ashley. From the corner of Chloe’s eye she can see Ashley’s face drop as she finds the name listed under the delivery. “But I’m not sure if you’re gonna get away with any tricks on this one.”

“What do you mean?”

“Your porter is Beca Mitchell. I don’t know much about her, only rumors,” answers Ashley, a slight crease of concern in her brow.

“Of her legendary FedEx skills?” jokes Chloe. 

“I don’t know anything about how she makes deliveries. All I know is... some people call her the Composer of Death.”


	2. Chapter 2

Chloe checks the contents of her bag one last time before zippering it shut. She turns around to look at her small room, taking in the small details of it. It’s strange to think how she won’t be returning to it for several weeks, maybe even longer. She doesn’t know how long the journey will take, especially with the inevitability of trekking through timefall and BT areas. 

Her heart races briefly at the idea of encountering a BT, a Beached Thing. An entity from the other side, but stuck on the world of the living. Invisible. Hostile. Trapped somewhere it doesn’t belong, with no means to return. Angry.  _ How on earth does someone prepare for that? _ Chloe wonders to herself.  _ How do you fight something that you can’t see, and something that’s already dead? _

“Are you sure you want to do this?” Ashley says, snapping Chloe out of her thoughts. Ashley’s leaning on the door frame to Chloe’s room, looking concerned.

“Yeah,” replies Chloe as she squares her shoulders. “It has to be done. If people are meant to survive the Death Stranding, we need to rise up and do something. Make progress. Nothing is achieved by just hoping things will get better. We can’t save people that way.”

Ashley nods, and her expression softens. Chloe knows where Ashley’s thoughts are going, and she braces herself. 

“She would be proud of you and everything you’ve done here,” Ashley says, taking a few steps forward and resting her hand on Chloe’s shoulder.

“It’s not enough,” replies Chloe. She can feel a lump forming in her throat. “It didn’t save her.”

“There’s nothing you could have done, Chloe.”

“I could have figured all this shit out sooner, could have pushed for the research faster-”

“You did everything you could have done,” interrupts Ashley. “And you’re going to save hundreds of Stephanies with this research.”

Chloe opens her mouth to argue, but words fail her. Ashley wraps her arms around her friend and holds her tight for a few moments. The two separate when the intercom in Chloe’s room crackles to life.

“Hey, uh...this is Porter Beca Mitchell here to escort Dr. Beale.”

Chloe smiles a slightly tearful thank you at Ashley before going to the intercom and pressing a button to reply. “Be there in a minute.”

“Come back safe, ok?” Ashley says as she hands Chloe her bag. “And be careful with this porter.”

“I will, Ashley.”

====

Beca’s in the middle of fixing her Bridges hat when the door to the bunker opens up with a dull squeak. A tall woman with long, wavy red hair ascends the steps and stands in front of Beca.

The life of a porter is extremely solitary, consisting solely of journeying alone across the barren landscape of the United Cities of America. The most Beca interacts with other people is when she makes a delivery, and even it’s only a hologram of the individual. No civilians ever leave the safety of their bunker. They leave the surface of the UCA to the porters and Beached Things, wanting no part of it. So it is rare that Beca is ever in the presence of an actual human being, yet alone one as attractive as Chloe Beale.

“Uh,” begins Beca, not fully prepared for any of this.

“Hi! You must be Beca Mitchell,” Chloe says with a warm smile. She extends her hand towards Beca. “I’m Chloe Beale.”

Beca flinches slightly at the offering, and then pointedly ignores it. She crosses her arms and regains her composure. “That’s me. Alright, so let’s get down to business. I have some ground rules that you’re gonna need to follow if this trip is going to be successful. You’re technically my cargo and I’m not gonna receive any Likes from you if you’re dead. And then if you’re dead, I’m going to need to make a second trip to an incinerator before you go into necrosis, which I won’t get any Likes for either. Hence the need for these important rules. Rule number one- you do as I say. I’ve been outside every day dealing with this shit way longer than you, so I know what’s up. What I say goes. Number two- don’t touch me. I’m not a fan of it. I’m not touching you either, so that handshake isn’t gonna happen. Number three- don’t do anything stupid that will put us in danger. If you listen to rule numero uno, you shouldn’t have to worry about this one. Got it?”

Chloe looks slightly baffled and then lowers her outstretched arm slowly. She shoves her hand in her pocket, a little deflated. “Right, ok. Got it.”

“Good,” Beca nods and looks Chloe over. “Now we have to talk about what you’re going to be wearing for this delivery. Timefall eats away at literally everything it touches. It ages shit faster than you can even imagine, and that is no exaggeration. You’re gonna have to be covered head to toe the whole time we’re traveling unless we have shelter. Timefall can start at any moment and with no warning so you have to dress like it.”

Beca unclips a pair of boots from her backpack and pushes them against Chloe’s torso. Chloe fumbles the boots a little, being mindful not to touch Beca’s hands.

“Those are Bridges porter grade boots that’ll last way longer than whatever you have on your feet right now.”

“Thanks, Beca,” Chloe says genuinely. She definitely didn’t think about the severity of the rain they would encounter.

“Sure thing,” Beca replies, shrugging off her backpack. She retrieves several metal cargo cases and gives them to Chloe in the same abrupt manner. “One of these has a porter grade outfit that you have to wear at all times from this point on. Unless we find some shelter of course. The other one has a timefall resistant backpack cover to put over your own.”

“Thank you,” repeats Chloe. She runs her fingers over the cargo box, surprised to see the corners covered in rust. It looks like the package is several years old. “This is…”

“From the timefall, yeah,” Beca finishes. “The metal is pretty resistant, but it’s only a matter of time before the rain destroys it. And that was only from being exposed to it for like, twenty minutes.”

Chloe’s eyes widen as she starts to get the idea of what exactly she’s getting herself into.

Beca clocks the change in Chloe’s expression and raises an eyebrow. She smirks. “You sure you can handle all this, Doc? Hanging out with test tubes or whatever is a lot safer.”

Chloe flushes slightly at Beca’s dig. 

The porter is standing with her arms crossed, her deep blue eyes studying Chloe with a challenging intensity that almost takes Chloe’s breath away. As the doctor regains her composure, she uses the time to fully take in Beca. She’s shorter than Chloe, but despite her size she must be carrying at least thirty pounds worth of cargo in her backpack. There’s also metal packages attached to both her biceps and thighs. A folded ladder is poking up from the side of Beca’s pack. Chloe pushes away the thought that there must be quite the muscular physique underneath all of that rain resistant clothing.

She sets her jaw and meets Beca’s gaze. “I’m fine.”

Beca’s smirk widens across her face, amused by Chloe’s determination. “If you say so, Beale. Just go back down and change into all that stuff quickly and then we’ll get going. We can make some decent time while the sun is still up so-”

Beca’s sentence dissolves into a slight choking noise as Chloe begins taking off her clothes right in front of her, stripping down to a tank top and underwear. Beca turns away so rapidly that all the weight she’s carrying nearly sends her back onto her ass.

Chloe grins victoriously, her stomach doing flips as she cherishes the sight of Beca’s red face. “You said fast, didn’t you?”

Beca’s now staring determinedly at the metal wall of the bunker. “I did but not like, well,  _ that _ .”

There’s the sound of two dull clicks as Chloe opens the cargo case containing the Bridges outfit. 

“I’m just doing what you said, Beca. Following your rules,” Chloe states simply, truly delighted by how quickly Beca's tough attitude crumbled.

Beca opens her mouth to retort, but her brain is too busy trying to not to think about Chloe’s body to think of a clever quip. She lets the response die and instead opens the map on her cuff link. 

As Beca attempts to plot out a travel route on the holographic map, Chloe finishes getting dressed.

“Done,” says Chloe. 

Beca reluctantly turns around, and breathes a sigh of relief when she sees Chloe fully dressed and in the process of slipping her boots on.

“Give a porter a warning next time.”

“And miss seeing that look on your face? Not a chance.”

Beca pouts and jerks her head to the door. “You ready?”

Chloe takes a calming breath. “Yeah.”

Beca walks up to the heavy metal door of the bunker. She pulls down on the handle and pauses thoughtfully for a moment. “You might wanna cover your eyes a bit. It’s been a long time since you’ve seen the sun.”

Chloe nods and cups her hands over her brow. A jolt of nerves and excitement run down her spine.

A loud clunk followed by a long metallic screech signal Beca opening the door to the outside world. Chloe nearly flinches from the anticipation of it all, but she finds something within herself to take steps forward out into the world. Her feet crunch onto the ground, no longer touching the manmade surfaces she’s known her whole life.

Still covering her face, Chloe looks down at the earth beneath her feet. It’s a mix of soil and rock, and she drags her foot across it experimentally, marveling at the way her touch influences its form. It’s so beautifully organic that a joyful laugh nearly escapes Chloe’s lips.

Chloe takes another breath and slowly brings her gaze to the horizon. The world meets her face with such a sheer brightness that she has to close her eyes for several moments. She blinks them rapidly, willing herself to adjust so she can finally register the earth she has had to hide from for so long. Finally, finally, the sky dims to a bearable level and Chloe’s mouth falls open.

The rocky, misshapen earth consumes half of her vision. Smooth grassy surfaces mix with slabs of stone and gravel, a chaotic patchwork of landscape that eventually melts into mountains and cliffs in the far distance. The sky is gray, clouds obstructing the sun. And yet this does not stop its strength, and Chloe’s eyes squint to adjust again. As the image in front of her becomes clear again, she drops her hands to her sides. Chloe takes a slow breath, savoring the way the fresh air travels into her expanding lungs.

Beca is standing beside Chloe, quietly observing her taking everything in. Letting her reacquaint herself with the world she has forgotten. 

Chloe closes her eyes again, and reopens them half expecting the scenery before her to disappear. That instead she’d wake up to see the familiar four walls of her bedroom, the box she had unknowingly been suffocating in so long that it seemed normal, commonplace. 

Tears swim in Chloe’s eyes. “This is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

Beca’s face softens entirely as she watches the doctor trace the distant mountains with her eyes. Something permanently melts inside of Beca in that moment, and it terrifies her. She swallows, watching Chloe’s face become a canvas for a mix of emotions, each one painting themselves masterfully across her skin. 

“Yeah,” Beca says quietly, mesmerized by Chloe Beale. “It is.”

“I can’t believe you get to see this every day,” Chloe says, her voice breaking slightly.

“Well, it gets kind of old when the things that wanna kill you show up,” Beca replies with half a smile. “But yeah. I get you.”

“What-” Chloe begins, eyebrows knitting together as she studies something in the sky.

Beca follows the doctor’s line of sight and nods. “Ah yeah. I suppose you haven’t seen the rainbow before.”

“It’s-”

“Inverted, yeah,” Beca finishes. “It may look pretty, but that’s one of the things you have to watch out for out here. That tells you where the timefall is.”

“Oh wow,” Chloe says quietly. She points at a thin black tendril far off in the distance that appears to drop from the clouds above down into the earth. “And those?”

“BTs,” Beca answers. 

A chill runs through Chloe, making the hair stand up on her neck.

“Where there’s timefall, there’s BTs. From way back like this, you’ll only see those dark strands. And you better hope this is how close we’ll ever get to them.”

Chloe stares at the dark tendrils with a growing sense of dread. She shifts the pack on her shoulders nervously.

“Still beautiful?” asks Beca. 

Chloe looks at her, expecting that annoying smirk on the porter’s face but is surprised to find only concern.

“Yeah,” Chloe nods. “Just a little scary.”

Beca laughs softly. “Yeah, just a little.”

Chloe bites her lip, her face lined with worry.

Beca scratches her head briefly, wishing she knew how to be comforting, and also wondering why she cares about being comforting. This is just a job, same as any. This doctor is just her cargo, and Beca is just a tool to her. Nothing more. Simple. Beca’s heart beats a bit faster in her chest in protest of the notion. She swears to herself and attempts a reassuring tone. “But the fact that you’re scared is good. It means you have some level of self preservation, and you’re gonna need that. Combine that with your smarts and you’ll be fine.”

“Thanks, Beca,” Chloe replies with a warm smile.

“Sure,” Beca waves away the gratitude, looking away as fast as she can. “You ready?”

“Yeah.”

“Alright, let’s go.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey everyone, sorry for starting this and dropping it like a hot potato for so long. I'm hoping to get back into it with all the time we're all spending at home now. Thank you guys so much for being patient, I really appreciate it.


	3. Chapter 3

Whatever sort of empathy Beca had for Chloe Beale earlier has quickly vanished in the first five hours of their travel. They’ve barely covered half of the ground she was hoping to achieve at this point in the day. Beca’s severely underestimated how much slower this journey would be with a complete novice. Chloe has tripped over the terrain several times, including one time where she almost sent Beca toppling over with her. They’ve had to stop another handful of times for Chloe to catch her breath. At this rate, this job could take months. Beca curses quietly to herself and glances over her shoulder.

“You still back there, Beale?”

“I’m trying,” Chloe replies, exasperated. She adjusts her backpack clumsily as she attempts to move her aching legs faster to catch up to the porter.

“You’ve gotta try harder than that,” Beca says, irritated. Her patience is dwindling down to nothing. “We still have a long way to go before we reach a Bridges waystation.”

“I’m doing as much as I can,” shoots back Chloe. “I haven’t exactly been in the position to take a hike in the past fifteen years!”

Beca stops in her tracks and turns around. “Give me your shit.”

“Excuse me?”

“Give. Me. Your shit,” Beca enunciates, gesturing to Chloe’s backpack. “You can’t handle it so give it to me.”

Chloe’s face twists in annoyance. “I can handle it!”

“That’s really cute of you to think Beale, but you can’t. You’ve been dragging behind me all day and we still have hours to go. Just focus on walking on those delicate feet for now.”

Chloe resolutely tightens her grip on her pack. “No.”

Beca rolls her eyes and marches up to the doctor. “Beale, we’re not in the kind of environment where we have the luxury of messing around. Give me the bag.”

“Stop talking to me like that!” Chloe says, taking a step back from Beca.

“Like what?”

“Like I’m some idiot who doesn’t know what they’re getting into!”

“You don’t know what you’re getting into!”

Chloe’s mouth opens in shock and anger. Her face is red when she responds, “And you don’t know how to talk to people! When’s the last time you bothered to interact with anybody? Do you even remember how to treat people properly?”

Beca looks at Chloe with wild eyes, and Chloe knows she’s struck a nerve. Beca’s mouth turns into a thin line and she looks like she’s fighting off a thousand different replies. Her eyes close. When they open again, her expression is less intense. “You’re right. It’s been a long time. Years.”

Chloe’s frustration falters immediately and she tries not to let her face fall in sympathy.

Beca’s eyes fall to a place slightly above Chloe’s shoulder. “Maybe being a porter fucked me up, I don’t know. But even if it did, you shouldn’t suffer for it. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s not,” Beca shakes her head and sighs. “I’ll try to be better at the whole talking thing.”

“And I’ll try to be better at hiking,” Chloe offers. There’s an earnestness to Beca’s words that makes Chloe want to rest a comforting hand on Beca’s shoulder. Chloe can’t even imagine not being in the presence of another person for years. The loneliness would consume her.

“Deal,” nods Beca. “Just...let me take the bag for now, okay? The terrain is going to get hard enough without extra weight. When you want it, I’ll give it back.”

“Okay,” agrees Chloe, and hands it over. It’s both a physical and mental relief to not have the heavy backpack digging into her shoulders. Not like she’d dare admit it.

With an air of practiced familiarity, Beca swings the bag up onto her own and makes sure it’s secure. She begins to walk forward but stops and turns to face Chloe again.

“Try to feel the earth under your feet,” Beca says slowly, like she’s thinking through something.

“What?”

“When you walk. Try to really feel the earth under your feet.”

“These soles are so thick, how am I supposed to-”

Beca waves a hand to cut her off. “I mean like...think about connecting to the ground. Feel it. You’re used to taking solid, stable ground for granted-”

Beca pauses and looks at Chloe questioningly. She’s asking if that is too insulting.

“You’re fine,” Chloe says, and the porter looks slightly relieved before continuing.

“You’re not used to having to pay attention when you walk. When you’re out here, you gotta be aware about it. And when it’s just you and no other living thing for miles, you wanna feel like you’re connected to something. So it might as well be the earth you walk on,” Beca finishes.

Chloe considers the idea, gently swiping her foot to the side in the ground as she does so. She hears the soft scrape of dirt move under her, the soil adapting itself to her presence. Bringing her foot back to its original position, Chloe imagines her weight driving into the earth. At the same time she entertains the idea of the earth meeting her, pressing up into her boot with equal energy. Opposite forces coming together to keep her connected to the ground. If this connection is stable, then the unpredictable surface of the earth cannot shake her.

“I like that,” Chloe says, taking a few conscious steps forward. _Why just use the earth when you can be a part of it?_ she thinks to herself. 

“Good,” replies Beca. She nods a bit awkwardly before resuming her stride forward. Chloe smiles slightly at her retreating form before following suit.

====

“Remember that connection thing I said?” asks Beca another hour later. She detaches her folded ladder from her tool rack. 

“Yeah,” Chloe replies. “I’ve been thinking about it, I feel like it really helps.”

“Cool. Cuz you’re gonna put that to the test now.”

“What’s the ladder for?”

“Crossing a ravine.”

“A ravine?” says Chloe incredulously.

“Yep.”

Chloe’s eyes bulge. “You’re joking.”

“Nope,” Beca replies. She points at a rock slab ahead of her.

Chloe quickens her pace to catch up to where Beca is standing, ignoring the way her tired legs scream in protest. 

Sure enough, the rock stretches forward, reaching towards its companion on the other side. The space between them must be about ten feet.

“We can’t just go-?” Chloe begins to ask. 

“Where?” Beca interrupts, tracing the craggily edge in the air with a gloved finger.

The ravine stretches outward for miles, with no end in sight. It looks like the ground was pulled apart by the seams.

“An elevator?” says Chloe, knowing it's only wishful thinking.

Beca laughs, a foreign sound to Chloe. “Come on, Beale. It’ll be fine.”

Chloe takes a cautious step closer to the edge, peering at the drop below. It’s a long way down, maybe about fifty feet. “How is this _fine_?”

Beca has that smirk playing across her face again, and Chloe can’t tell if there’s butterflies in her stomach from that or the prospect of walking across the ravine. 

“I’ve done this hundreds of times. It’s not as bad as you think.”

“Well you’re...you! You do this every day!” exclaims Chloe.

“And I was in your position once,” Beca responds flatly. She flicks the metal ladder away from herself and it elongates with a series of clicks. “There’s a first time for everything, Doc.”

Chloe tries to imagine a version of Beca that is new to all of this, and struggles to believe that such a thing could be true. 

“I can go first,” offers Beca.

“What if I need help getting across?”

“Then you go first.”

“But-”

“This ladder isn’t designed for the weight of two people at once, Beale,” says Beca, setting it down and pushing on it slightly to make sure it’s steady. “It’s gotta be you first or me.”

Chloe shifts her weight from foot to foot, considering her options. She’s not sure which one is less terrifying.

Beca’s crooked smile turns into an impatient frown as Chloe remains silent and glued to the spot. The porter scowls and is about to snap when she remembers their earlier agreement and stops herself.

“Beale,” Beca starts. Chloe can nearly feel how much Beca’s concentrating on her words. “Even if there were a way around this one, there’s going to be something else we are going to need to cross eventually. You’re not always going to be ready for something. There’s not always going to be a perfect time. Not out here. We’re not in your bunker anymore.”

“Okay,” Chloe says, trying to take a breath. “Okay.”

“I’ll go first,” says Beca. She turns her Bridges cap backwards to get the brim out of her line of sight. “Watch how I go across. Feel the ladder under your feet, and how your weight affects it. Move slow.”

Chloe nods. Beca’s words seem partially drowned out by the blood pumping in her ears.

“Watch how I move,” repeats Beca as she steps up to the ladder. She moves onto the first rung, her arms partially outstretched to the sides. A second step on the next rung. Chloe watches Beca take a breath, makes sure she’s balanced, and then slowly and smoothly makes it to the other side. She turns to face Chloe. “Ta da!”

Chloe attempts a confident smile but thinks it might look more like a grimace. She walks up to the ladder, wondering how her sore body could possibly guide her through this.

“Here,” says Beca, tossing a nylon rope over to Chloe, who catches it. “Clip that to your suit if you want. I’ve got the other end.”

Chloe hooks the rope to her outfit without even thinking twice. She steps onto the first rung of the ladder that’s still on rock to test it out. She glances up at Beca and then back down at the ladder.

“Breathe. Connect with the ladder. And I’ve got you just in case,” Beca encourages. “Trust me, it’ll be okay. Trust me.”

Chloe finds Beca’s eyes and earnest expression again. _Trust her? This rude person who she just met? Who has a very sinister name in the porter community?_ Chloe thinks to herself incredulously. _Ashley would be screaming at me to turn back and go home_. Go home before trusting this woman with her life.

But she does trust her, a small voice hiding in Chloe’s heart says. She shouldn’t, and has no reason to, but she does. She trusts Beca. Her heart jumps in approval of the admittance. 

“Okay,” says Chloe. “Here I go.”

Chloe steps on the next rung of the ladder, and she mirrors the way she saw Beca holding herself and finds her balance. Another step.

“That’s it,” Beca waves her forward. “You’re doing fine.”

Chloe holds her arms further out to stabilize herself as she takes another step. Look at the ladder, step, look at Beca. Ladder, step, Beca. Ladder, step, Beca. The slow rhythm of the words mirror her movements, and before Chloe knows it she’s on the other side.

“Good job, Doc,” grins Beca.

“I- I did it? I did it!” beams Chloe. She nearly flings her arms around Beca in relief and exhilaration, but catches herself as she sees Beca’s wide eyes. “Thanks for the help!”

“That was all you. I didn’t do anything,” Beca says, already starting to resume their travel. She immediately changes the subject. “Leave the ladder there, by the way. It’s sort of like an unspoken porter code. We try to help each other travel by leaving behind equipment whenever we can.”

“Hey,” Chloe says as she quickens her pace to meet up with Beca. She steps in front of the porter to get her to stop. She won’t allow Beca to distract her. “Let me thank you.”

“I didn’t do-” Beca starts, furrowing her brow.

“You helped me work up the courage to do that. And you’re helping me by even agreeing to take me on this trip. Thank you.”

Beca looks everywhere but Chloe’s eyes for a solid twenty seconds. Chloe’s heart sinks as she realizes that she’s talking to someone who has most likely never received an expression of gratitude before. She’s starting to understand how thankless of a job being a porter really is.

Beca’s dark blue eyes finally fall on Chloe’s. The doctor can see genuine surprise and... something else, deep and hidden.

“No problem, Beale,” Beca says quietly. She clears her throat. “Do you wanna rest a bit? I think you’ve earned it.”

=====

“Beca,” Chloe says softly. She crouches next to the porter, who’s sitting fast asleep with her back propped up against a large boulder. Beca had been very resistant to the idea of taking a rest after Chloe, but Chloe had insisted until she finally broke down and agreed. The dark circles under the porter’s eyes were a clear indication that Beca needed some sleep, despite her protesting.

Beca stirs in her sleep a bit but doesn’t wake.

“Beca!” Chloe says louder. She moves to shake Beca’s shoulders, and her fingers graze Beca’s jacket.

The porter wakes with a start and jerks her body away from Chloe’s hands. “Beale, what?”

“Sorry!” Chloe curses to herself. She still forgets about Beca’s aversion to touch. “Sorry to wake you, it’s just-”

“Shit!” Beca looks around at the darkened sky in horror. “Timefall-”

As soon as the word escapes her, the rain begins falling. There’s a soft beeping as Beca’s automated hood on her jacket deploys. Chloe pulls her own up.

Chloe shields her face to study the sky. The inverted rainbow hangs above them in the distance. A sinking feeling grows in her gut.

“Listen,” Beca explains as she stands up and starts typing wildly on the touch screen on her forearm. She drags a finger across what looks like a volume control on her other arm. Without warning, the rain falls harder in sheets. “Whatever you do, don’t expose your skin to the timefall. Hell, anything you consider important, keep it out of the rain unless you wanna see it become a fossil in a few minutes. Now we gotta move fast because we don’t have a lot of time before-”

A sudden chill permeates the air around the two of them. Chloe reflexively hugs herself in an attempt to stay warm.

“Shit,” Beca whispers, the word accompanied by a cloud of condensation. Her gaze wanders to the ground at their feet and she points at it to get Chloe’s attention. Chloe’s never seen anything like it before- the grass looks like it’s stuck in a time lapse video on a loop. Sprouting, growing, dying. Repeat.

“What-” Chloe says, too in awe of such a strange phenomenon to realize the level of noise she’s making.

Beca makes a sharp cutting motion across her throat, throwing daggers at Chloe. She puts a finger to her lips, her expression hard and stern.

Chloe gives her an apologetic look but Beca doesn’t notice, she’s busy pressing a button on her jacket that brings the odradeck strapped to her shoulder to life. Its metal leaf-like appendages expand out to expose a light at its center, illuminating the now incredibly dark space around them.

The air between them turns to ice as a jarring squelching noise rings off a few feet away. Chloe has to bite her tongue to prevent her teeth from chattering.

Another loud, wet thud. The impact of it feels like it shakes Chloe’s insides. But it’s nothing compared to the sound that comes next. Thud. Followed by the horrible, unnatural mixture of a rattling breath and almost reptilian dull roar. The imprint of a hand sinks into the wet soil about five feet away from them. Then another. Closer. A squelch punctuated by that terrifying, gurgling breath. Another handprint. Closer, closer still. 

Chloe watches Beca cover her mouth with her hand, stifling any sound she could be producing. Her other hand is frozen at the various controls of her odradeck. Chloe follows suit and presses her own hand to her mouth, holding her breath.

With her own heart nearly beating out of her chest, Chloe almost can’t hear the next thump from a mere three feet away from them. The disembodied hand presses into the earth, and Chloe’s now so close that she sees an almost tar like substance pool into the indentation.

A beached thing. Unseen. Despite being an entity that does not belong in the land of the living, its presence is undeniable. Overwhelming and unshakable. 

It knows they’re here.

And it’s ready to drag the two of them onto the Beach.


	4. Chapter 4

Beca’s eyes dart to Chloe’s, her face cast in shadow from the light of her odradeck over her shoulder. A look of warning mixed with an apology. She presses her finger to her lips as a reminder. Chloe nods. She doesn’t need to be told twice.

Another handprint shakes the ground followed by a low, guttural noise. Even through the heavy jacket she’s wearing, Chloe can feel the hairs on both arms raise. _How on earth do you escape something you can’t see?_ Chloe thinks, horrified. She looks back over at Beca.

The porter seems to be waiting for something, her left hand hovering over the square touchpad on her right forearm. Her gaze is glued to the wet soil in front of them. Moments of stomach churning silence hang between the two women, staccatoed only by the unseen source of horrible, inhuman rasping breath.

The rain is coming down even harder, and Chloe now hears a soft sizzling sound that makes her eyebrow raise in confusion. Her eyes find Beca’s, and Beca jerks her head down to her right shoulder briefly. The cargo package strapped there has faint smoke rolling off of it, and Chloe watches rust start to form around its metal edges. Chloe swallows nervously and gives her hood a paranoid tug to make sure she’s completely covered.

Beca takes a deep breath and taps play on her touchpad. Her heart is pounding in her chest despite how many times she has been in this scenario before. She hopes she doesn’t get dragged this time.

The odradeck perched above her shoulder closes its metal appendages, forming a small phonograph-like shape. A binaural, humming beat starts to ring out from a speaker at its center.

Chloe looks over at Beca in horror, afraid of what the sound will do to the BTs.

The thuds, handprints, rattling exhales, all of it- ceases immediately. Beca waits a moment before slowly dragging a finger across the other control pad on her left forearm. The vibrating music becomes louder, and yet it is still soft somehow. A ringing, harmonious frequency starts to dominate the air around them. It’s absolutely beautiful. Chloe can feel the tension leave her body as a sense of calm and pure clarity take its place. It’s unlike anything she has ever heard before, and she feels like she would never be able to properly describe it to anyone else. Intangible, otherworldly, and yet...the most natural music she’s ever heard. 

And so it’s completely jarring when a floating, staticy human figure materializes a mere four feet away from them with a soft exhale. Chloe’s hands fly to her mouth to stop herself from screaming. It’s not alone. There’s suddenly dozens of BTs scattered throughout the land around them, all hovering about five feet from the earth. They’re made of what appears to be tiny black particles, swimming in space, never fully solidifying to a concrete spot. But the shape that they form loosely is undeniable. A human. What once was, but is no more. A cord comes from its center and drifts abstractly up into the sky for as long as Chloe can see.

Beca reaches out a hand towards Chloe, gesturing for her to calm down. She doesn’t look surprised at all that these entities have become present. 

_She...drew them into this plane_ , Chloe thinks to herself, absolutely bewildered. _She brought them from the Beach into the world of the living, at least partially._

_The Composer of Death._ Ashley’s words ring through Chloe’s mind. A chill runs down her spine.

Beca nods her head in a direction in front of them, and then makes a weaving motion with her arm.

Chloe’s stomach plummets in her body. _Sneak around them? Is she joking?_

As if in response, Beca crouches down and starts to walk slowly, making sure to create as little sound as possible. The odradeck spins to face forward, still playing the soothing, almost dreamlike music. The calm it gave Chloe moments before has vanished. Its once graceful melody now feels tainted. Haunting just like the entities it brought into this world, no longer beautiful.

Chloe collects herself, then mirrors Beca by getting down low and starts trailing behind her. She glances back at the BT slightly swaying in the air behind them. The sight is absolutely unsettling and makes Chloe’s skin crawl. But she's surprised to notice it is not following them.

Beca steadily makes progress ahead, being mindful of the wet rocks scattered around the earth. Chloe watches in horror as more BTs slowly coalesce in the pouring rain in front of them, brought into visibility by the alluring frequency. She turns her attention to the ground instead as she walks, willing herself to think about the connection Beca told her about earlier. Anything to stop herself from focusing on the entities surrounding her.

Their trek is slow but purposeful, tense and stressful. Chloe swears the number of BTs is lessening now, but is unsure if that’s just wishful thinking. The rain, while still fairly strong, feels like it's starting to taper off. _Please_ , Chloe thinks, _let this end_.

And then her foot slips on a particularly sharp rock.

Beca whips around the moment she hears Chloe fall forward onto her knees. Two things happen in quick succession- a loud roar rips through the air directly behind Chloe, and Beca swipes to change the track playing. A slightly frantic, building piece now erupts from the odradeck’s speakers. It fits Chloe’s wild heartbeat as she looks behind her to see a BT dive into the ground with a loud, sickening whack. It dissipates as it strikes, but near deafening cracks tear through the earth, sending tar splattering up with each sound. It’s charging right at her. 

Chloe scrambles to try to stand up and falls again, her body nearly paralyzed by fear. A strong hand grabs a fistful of the back of her jacket and yanks her upward. Chloe stumbles onto her feet, and spins around to see Beca facing the BT's path. The ground in front of the porter fills with the same tar-like substance that was in the imprints from earlier. An incoherent shape emerges from it, slowly sculpting itself into an outstretched hand, grabbing, reaching…

Beca swipes the volume on her forearm to its loudest level, the crescendoing music blaring at a level so painful Chloe covers her ears. As the track builds, the more nonsensical the rhythm and notes become. Beca swiftly takes a few steps backward as a faceless humanoid figure from the torso up starts protruding from the black goo, its rasping breath competing with the porter’s music. The odradeck on Beca’s shoulder bends itself forward, as much as it can to close the distance between the BT, the disconcerting track blasting from the speaker. The entity is in the process of swiping at Beca’s ankle, but the sound is too much for it, and it retracts with an angry roar. Beca bends over, the odradeck mere inches from the faceless entity, chasing it back into the pool where it originated from. There’s an inhuman shriek followed by a slow sucking sound as the tar pool drains itself away from the porter.

The timefall stops abruptly and the sky clears. A soft beep signals Beca’s hood lowering. She presses a button and her odradeck ceases playing before folding itself up behind her shoulder. 

“You gotta work on that connection to the earth, Beale,” is all Beca says before resuming her walk forward, as if nothing happened.

Chloe watches her with her mouth agape, still frozen on the spot. 

“Come on,” Beca calls over her shoulder, unfazed. “There’s shelter up ahead.”

====

“How...how did you- what-” Chloe stammers.

“I’ll explain once we’re inside,” replies Beca. She leads Chloe up the steps to a Bridges building, their shelter for the night. 

Chloe looks up at the giant triangular concrete awning stretching forward to protect its entrance from timefall. She can already tell this facility will be much larger than her bunker. 

Beca makes her way down the sloped floor and stops at a conveyer belt, where she unloads several containers from her bag. She presses a button on the belt, causing the packages to be rolled away further into the building. A little jingle plays from Beca’s cufflink as she checks the number of Likes she’s received for the delivery. She shrugs a bit in acceptance and then turns to Chloe.

“You hungry?” Beca asks.

Chloe’s about to say no when her stomach grumbles. With the stress of the day finally over, her body finally registers how starving and exhausted she is. “Yeah.”

“Come on then,” Beca motions her over to an elevator. “The next floor down is the cafeteria. The floor below that has all the private rooms for porters. That’s where we’ll be staying tonight.”

“Okay.”

The elevator doors open to a hallway that leads into a large, spacious cafeteria. The room is sparsely decorated aside from the word Bridges stenciled across one of the concrete walls. A few porters are widely spaced out at various tables, making the cafeteria feel even larger.

Beca and Chloe walk up to the buffet at one end of the room, and help themselves to the decent variety of food before selecting a table far away from everyone else. Beca takes off her backpack with a sigh of relief before sitting down.

“How do you wear that thing all day?” asks Chloe sympathetically.

Beca rubs her shoulders briefly with a small wince. She cracks her neck. “You get used to it.”

A silence falls between them as they begin to eat, but it's not necessarily uncomfortable. 

“How do you do it?”

“What?” mumbles Beca through a mouthful of chicken.

“You know what,” Chloe points at her with her fork. 

“Music is a powerful thing, Beale. People say it’s a universal language.”

“Okay…” Chloe says slowly, unsure of where this is going.

“You know what’s also said to be a universal language?”

Chloe shrugs.

“Math. And the two of them go together.”

“But...it was like you _controlled_ those things,” Chloe says, taking a bite of her salad. “I don’t get it.”

“You combine two universal languages together,” replies Beca. “Two things that are understood by everyone around the world, no matter where you go. Why would it be any different across the worlds of the living and the dead?”

Chloe shivers at the thought. “So the Beached Things can hear the music you play and they...just react to it?”

“Well it can’t be any kind of music, Beale. I can’t just play the Cha Cha Slide at them and they’ll go fuck off.”

“What does it have to be then?”

“The golden ratio. Phi. 1.618,” Beca gestures to the symbol on her sleeve. “It’s a specific number derived from the Fibonacci sequence. In less nerdy terms it’s a pattern found in nature, over and over again. It’s found in everything. No one’s quite sure why. I took a gamble one day and made the assumption that phi could be found in the Beach too.”

“And?” whispers Chloe, her mind racing to keep up.

Beca splays out her hands. “It fucking worked. I couldn’t believe it. That first track you heard, that was the first one I made. Well, it’s a more improved version. It’s binaural beats at a frequency of 1.618 Hertz. There were studies done that say it helps ground people, it centers them. Like for meditation and stuff. But if you’re a BT...it grounds you to the plane of the living. Well, almost.”

“It grounds them enough to make them visible to anyone, not just people who have Dooms. That's how you're able to navigate BT areas without getting caught,” says Chloe, exhilarated by what this could mean scientifically. A way to show BTs...no such thing has ever been done before. “You’re a genius!”

Beca laughs, a hollow sound. “My mom was. She was the mathematician. She was obsessed with all this Fibonacci stuff, she wouldn’t shut up about it. I always drowned her out. But after she died…”

Beca’s voice trails off with a soft strangled sound. She looks down at her food tray.

Chloe’s eyebrows knit together in concern. She slides her hand over across the table and gently touches the cuff of Beca’s jacket sleeve, being mindful of the porter’s hand. Chloe swears she can hear the smallest exhale of relief from Beca. She doesn’t jerk her arm away.

“Sorry, I...realized I’ve never talked about her to anybody before,” Beca says quietly. “Saying it out loud…”

“I know what you mean,” replies Chloe genuinely, finding Beca’s eyes. A mutual understanding passes between them, the kind that only two people with heavy losses can feel and acknowledge. Unspoken and powerful.

After a long look into Chloe’s eyes, Beca tries again. “After she died...I regretted never paying attention to it. So I took all of her notes and research and studied it. Got the idea to apply it out there, being a porter. It worked. And even after all this time since she’s been gone...she’s been saving my life.”

“I wish I could have met her,” Chloe says, smiling gently at Beca. “She sounds amazing.”

Beca laughs, a much more beautiful sound than the last one. “She would have loved you. As a big math nerd she would have loved to talk to a big science nerd.”

Chloe laughs too and smiles warmly at Beca. “You can always talk about her to me if you’d like. And I’d love to hear more about your work, it’s truly incredible.”

“Thanks,” Beca says with a crooked smile, her heart skipping a beat. She realizes that Chloe’s fingers are still touching her jacket and flushes pink. “Uh…”

“Oh right,” Chloe says, snapping back to reality with a flip of her stomach. She withdraws her hand abruptly.

“It’s alright. You weren’t touching me. Rule number two is still unbroken,” Beca says, standing up. Her hand feels like electricity is running through it, despite it not being the object under Chloe’s touch. Her mind starts to wonder what it would feel like to really have Chloe’s skin on hers.

“Are we...going to the room?” asks Chloe, standing and holding her tray.

“What?” Beca says. “Oh, uh...yeah. Let’s go.”

====

Beca and Chloe open the door to a porter room available for the evening. Chloe imagines that this is what a hotel must have been like, a place with multiple rooms waiting to be rented out to those in need of them.

The private room is fairly large and sparse just like the cafeteria, with a bed attached to the wall and a small bathroom tucked into the side. A rack of various Bridges supplies dominates another wall. Beca dumps both hers and Chloe’s backpacks on a table next to some complimentary water bottles and energy drinks.

“Hey, um,” Chloe begins, taking off her heavy rain jacket. “Thanks again for saving me today.”

“No problem,” Beca says, kicking off her boots. “It’s my job.”

“I hate to imagine what would have happened if that BT got me,” says Chloe with a shudder. “So thank you, really.”

“You were lucky there was only one that came out of that tar pit thing,” replies Beca. “If there’s more of them they would have overpowered you and dragged you into the center of the timefall storm.”

Chloe’s hand flies to her heart at the thought of it. “Oh my god...Beca, how do you know that?”

“It’s happened to me several times,” says Beca, her expression hard to read. She unzippers her jacket. “That success with the BT music didn’t happen overnight. There was some...trial and error.”

“What do you-” 

Chloe’s question remains unfinished as Beca finishes taking off her coat, leaving it in a heap on the floor. She’s wearing a gray tank top that has some padding on the shoulders, no doubt to alleviate some of the grueling weight she carries all day. The entirety of her arms are littered with what nearly looks like a reverse stencil of a handprint. It looks eerily like the same ones they saw in the soil hours ago.

“Oh Beca,” whispers Chloe.

“More errors than trials I guess you can say,” Beca says, and removes her tank top as well, standing there in only a sports bra and her Bridges pants. “Might as well show you the whole thing to save some gawking later on.”

Every inch of her toned skin is covered with the ghosts of handprints, some even overlaid with each other. Chloe is immediately reminded of photographs of cave paintings she’s seen in history books.

“God I’m so sorry, Beca,” says Chloe, wanting so badly to wrap her arms around the porter protectively.

Beca avoids Chloe’s eyes, afraid to meet the warmth and kindness she knows she’ll find there. “It’s hard to fight them off in the middle of the timefall. I have it all figured out now, so you don’t need to worry about this happening to you.”

“You’re truly the bravest person I’ve ever met,” Chloe says quietly. 

“I’m...going to go take a shower,” replies Beca awkwardly. She gathers a change of clothes and turns towards the bathroom.

Chloe swears she can hear the faintest, softest thank you as Beca walks away.


End file.
